Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Arcanus Amator by Elyzabeth M. VaLey

Arcanus Amator

As an Arcánús, one of Cupid’s blessed
children, Amandus’s mission in life was to aid his father in bestowing love
upon others.Unfortunately, when he found his own soul mate he was incapable of
making her perceive their connection. Furthermore, she doomed their love
forever. Amandus’s only hope is a spell concocted by Cupid: The Arcánús Amator:
Spell of the Secret Lovers.

Hailey is desperate for love. She’s so desperate that when she finds a
spell on the internet that promises to connect soul mates, she decides she must
try it. Convincing her friend Hannah to help her, the girls embark on a
one-night craze that will produce life-changing results and bring to life what
was thought to be only a myth.

Excerpt:She frowned. “What the hell’s happened?” She
was quite sure this was not how the spell worked. Granted, she hadn’t exactly
read the entire information sheet on the website.“No one does,” she whined, bouncing on the
balls of her feet while staring at the flickering flame of the candle. The
thing was more than 20 pages long. It was like reading one of those software
agreements. No one read the damn thing. She’d read the instructions and the
first page with all the warnings and that was more than enough. Taking a deep
breath, she managed to settle her nerves a little. Everyone thought she was the
ditsy blonde obsessed with the occult, but she wasn’t. She was a hard worker,
impatient when things didn’t go as expected. It was partially the reason why
she’d filed through so many relationships. Why stay with a guy when he clearly
had nothing to offer? Some of her friends argued that she didn’t give them a
chance. She begged to differ. She’d given them a chance, they just hadn’t taken
it. True, her impatience sometimes got her into
some trouble but it also saved her from a lot of it. That, however, wasn’t the
case now. Annoyed that the spell had gone awry, she brushed back her bangs
impatiently. Whatever had happened was not important. The priority was getting
Hannah back home. Scanning the room for her discarded laptop, she did a double
take.Obstructing the exit to the living room stood
the most gorgeous man she had laid eyes on. He was massive. His head almost
brushed the top of the doorframe. His heavily muscled arms were crossed in
front of him, his chest bare except for the intricate design of a red-inked
tattoo that started around his left nipple and descended across his side to his
hip. Low on his hips, he wore a long black skirt made out of what looked like
leather.Hailey hesitated a moment before finally
glancing fully at his face. Her breath stilled as their eyes locked. A clear
shade of violet, they were not from this world. Swallowing, she took a step
backwards without breaking her stare. The stranger’s eyes glittered with curiosity
and amusement. “Careful with the center of the star,” he
warned. Hailey stumbled and froze. His voice was deep
and commanding and had a familiar ring to it that sent her senses reeling.
Shaking her head slightly, she continued moving away from him.“Watch—”Breath exploded from her lungs as she crashed
into a shelf, a few ornaments she and Hannah kept, crashing to the floor.“—out. Are you all right?”Hailey winced, the back of the shelf digging
into her skin, but she nodded anyway. The stranger flashed her a grin that made
her knees weak. Hailey swallowed. The urge to see him smile again clawed at her
insides like a desperate hunger.Ignoring her, he glanced down at the
pentagram, his silky dark curls framing his strong jaw and straight nose.“You don’t look like you knew what you were
getting into.”Hailey held on to the bookcase behind her.
She was afraid that if she moved the whole thing would topple over her head and
she’d wake up, realizing that the man in the center of the room was nothing
more than a dream.“Read the first page of the instructions and
didn’t bother to read the rest, huh?”His eyes lifted to hers with a sassy smirk
that lit up his violet eyes. Hailey stared speechless, the urge to touch the
man making her palms itch as if she’d stepped into poison ivy.“Yeah, you never did care what you got into,
Ariadne.” Goose bumps sprouted over her flesh and
she released the shelf, rubbing her arms in an attempt to warm her suddenly
chilled skin. Ariadne. The name rang in her ears like a long forgotten
memory always running at the edge of her vision, just a breadth away from her
grasp.“I—”No words came out as he carefully watched her
face, almost as if saving every detail of her features into his memory. Her
mouth felt parched, her tongue too large, as she searched for words that
wouldn’t come. “Yes?”Butterflies danced in the pit of her stomach
and her chest tightened, making it difficult to breathe. Fear mingled with a
strange sense of joy. Names, places, and moments in time danced in the edge of
her vision, taunting her to remember them, taunting her to say them aloud but
fleeing before she could take hold of them.“My name isn’t…”The man raised his dark eyebrows, the shadow
of a smile lifting the edge of his full lips.“I know.”“Oh.”

Defined as
weird since she was about eight, Elyzabeth honors the title by making up songs
about her chores, doodling stars and flowers on any blank sheet of paper and
talking to her dog whenever he feigns interest.

Losing the
battle to the voices in her head is her favorite pastime after annoying her
younger sister with her singing. Writing stories full of passion and emotion
where love conquers all is her happy pill and she'll forgo sleep to make her
readers live the dream.